THE CONFESSION.
Gradually, the noise in the streets died away; the tread of feet, the
rumbling wheels, and the tinkle of car bells ceased, and not a sound was
heard, save as the distant fire bells pealed forth their warning voices,
or some watchman went hurrying by. The great city was asleep, and to
Morris the silence brooding over the countless throng was deeper, more
solemn, than the silence of the country, where nature gives out her own
mysterious notes and lullabies for her sleeping children. Slowly the
minutes went by, and Morris became at last aware that Wilford’s eyes,
instead of resting on the pallid face, which seemed to grow each moment
more pallid and ghastly, were fixed on _him_ with an expression which
made him drop the pale hand he was holding between his own, _pooring_ it
occasionally, as a mother might _poor_ and pity the hand of her dying
baby.
Before his marriage, a jealous thought of Morris Grant had found a
lodgment in Wilford’s breast; but he had tried to drive it out, and
fancied that he had succeeded, experiencing a sudden shock when he felt
it lifting its green head, and poisoning his mind against the man who
was doing for Katy only what a brother might do. He forgot that it was
his own entreaties which kept Morris there, away from his Silverton
patients, who were missing him so much, and complaining of his absence.
Jealous men never reason clearly, and in this case, Wilford did not
reason at all, but jumped readily at his conclusion, calling to his aid
as proof all that he had ever seen pass between Katy and her cousin.
That Morris Grant loved Katy was, after a few moments’ reflection, as
fixed a fact in his mind, as that she lay there between them, moaning
feebly, as if about to speak. Years before, jealousy had made Wilford
almost a madman, and it now held him again in its powerful grasp,
whispering suggestions he would have spurned in a calm frame of mind.
There was a clenching of his fist, a knitting of his brows, and a
gathering blackness in his eyes as he listened while Katy, rousing
partially from her lethargy, talked of the days when she was a little
girl, and Morris had built the play-house for her by the brook, where
the thorn-apples grew and the waters fell over the smooth, white rocks.
“Take me back there,” she said, “and let me lie on the grass again. It
is so long since I was there, and I’ve suffered so much since then.
Wilford meant to be kind, but he did not understand or know how I loved
the country with its birds and flowers and the grass by the well, where
the shadows come and go. I used to wonder where they were going, and one
day when I watched them I was waiting for Wilford and wondering if he
would ever come again. Would it have been better if he never had?”
Wilford’s body shook as he bent forward to listen, while Katy continued:
“Were there no Genevra, I should not think so, but there is, and yet
Morris said that made no difference when I telegraphed for him to come
and take me away.”
Morris felt keenly the awkwardness of his position, but he could offer
no explanation then. He could not speak with those fiery eyes upon him,
and he sat erect in his chair, while Katy talked of Silverton, until her
voice grew very faint, ceasing at last as she fell into a second sleep,
heavier, more death-like, than the first. Something in her face alarmed
Morris, and in spite of the eyes watching him he bent every energy to
retain the feeble pulse, and the breath which grew shorter with each
respiration.
“Do you think her dying?” Wilford asked, and Morris replied, “The look
about the mouth and nose is like the look which so often precedes
death.”
And that was all they said until another hour went by, when Morris’s
hand was laid upon the forehead and moved up under the golden hair where
there were drops of perspiration.
“She is saved! thank God, Katy is saved!” was his joyful exclamation,
and burying his face in his hands, he wept for a moment like a child.
On Wilford’s face there was no trace of tears. On the contrary, he
seemed hardening into stone, and in his heart fierce passions were
contending for the mastery. What did Katy mean by sending for Morris to
take her away? Did she send for him, and was that the cause of his being
there? If so, there was something between the cousins more than mere
friendship. The thought was a maddening one. And, rising slowly at last,
Wilford came round to Morris’s side, and grasping his shoulder, said,
“Morris Grant, you love Katy Cameron.”
Like the peal of a bell on the frosty air the words rang through the
room, starting Morris from his bowed attitude, and for an instant
curdling the blood in his veins, for he understood now the meaning of
the look which had so puzzled him. In Morris’s heart there was a
moment’s hesitancy to know just what to answer—an ejaculatory prayer for
guidance—and then lifting up his head, his calm blue eyes met the eyes
of black unflinchingly as he replied,
“I have loved her always.”
A blaze like sheet lightning shot from beneath Wilford’s eyelashes, and
a taunting sneer curled his lip as he said,
“_You_, a _saint_, confess to this?”
It was in keeping with human nature for Wilford to thrust Morris’s
religion in his face, forgetting that never on this side the eternal
world can man cease wholly to sin; that so long as flesh and blood
remain, there will be temptation, error, and wrong, even among God’s
children. Morris felt the sneer keenly; but the consciousness of peace
with his Maker sustained him in the shock, and with the same tone he had
at first assumed, he said,
“Should my being what you call a saint prevent my confessing what I
did?”
“No, not the confession, but the fact,” Wilford answered, savagely. “How
do you reconcile your acknowledged love for Katy with the injunctions of
the Bible whose doctrines you indorse?”
“A man cannot always control his feelings, but he can strive to overcome
them and put them aside. One does not sin in _being_ tempted, but in
listening _to_ the temptation.”
“Then according to your own reasoning you have sinned, for you not only
have been tempted but have yielded to the temptation,” Wilford retorted,
with a sinister look of exultation in his black eyes.
For a moment Morris was silent, while a struggle of some kind seemed
going on in his mind, and then he said,
“I never thought to lay open to you a secret which, after myself, is, I
believe, known to only one living being.”
“And that one—is—is Katy?” Wilford exclaimed, his voice hoarse with
passion, and his eyes flashing with fire.
“No, not Katy. She has no suspicion of the pain which, since I saw her
made another’s, has eaten into my heart, making me grow old so fast, and
blighting my early manhood.”
Something in Morris’s tone and manner made Wilford relax his grasp upon
the arm, and sent him back to his chair while Morris continued,
“Most men would shrink from talking to a husband of the love they bore
his wife, and an hour ago I should have shrunk from it too, but you have
forced me to it, and now you must listen while I tell you of my love for
Katy. It began longer ago than she can remember—began when she was my
baby sister, and I hushed her in my arms to sleep, kneeling by her
cradle and watching her with a feeling I have never been able to define.
She was in all my thoughts, her face upon the printed page of every book
I studied, and her voice in every strain of music I ever heard. Then
when she grew older, I used to watch the frolicsome child by the hour,
building castles of the future, when she would be a woman, and I a man,
with a man’s right to win her. I know that she shielded me from many a
snare into which young men are apt to fall, for when the temptation was
greatest, and I was at its verge, a thought of her was sufficient to
lead me back to virtue. I carried her in my heart across the sea, and
said when I go back I will ask her to be mine. I went back, but at my
first meeting with Katy after her return from Canandaigua, she told me
of _you_, and I knew then that hope for me was gone. God grant that you
may never experience what I experienced on that day which made her your
wife, and I saw her go away. It seemed almost as if God had forgotten me
as the night after the bridal I sat alone at home, and met that dark
hour of sorrow. In the midst of it _Helen_ came, discovering my secret,
and sympathizing with me until the pain at my heart grew less, and I
could pray that God would grant me a feeling for Katy which should not
be sinful. And He did at last, so I could think of her without a wish
that she was mine. Times there were when the old love would burst forth
with fearful power, and then I wished that I might die. These were my
moments of temptation which I struggled to overcome. Sometimes a song, a
strain of music, or a ray of moonlight on the floor would bring the past
to me so vividly that I would stagger beneath the burden, and feel that
it was greater than I could bear. But God was very merciful, and sent me
work which took up all my time, and drove me away from my own pain to
soothe the pain of others. When Katy came to us last summer there was an
hour of trial, when faith in God grew weak, and I was tempted to
question the justice of His dealing with me. But that too passed, and in
my love for your child I forgot the mother in part, looking upon her as
a sister rather than the Katy I had loved so well. I would have given my
life to have saved that child for her, even though it was a bar between
us, something which separated her from me more than the words she spoke
at the altar. Though dead, that baby is still a bar, and Katy is not the
same to me she was before that little life came into being. It is not
wrong to love her as I do now. I feel no pang of conscience save when
something unexpected carries me back to the old ground where I have
fought so many battles.”
Morris paused a moment, while Wilford said, “She spoke of telegraphing
for you. Why was that, and when?”
Thus interrogated, Morris told of the message which had brought him to
New York, and narrated as cautiously as possible the particulars of the
interview which followed.
Morris’s manner was that of a man who spoke with perfect sincerity, and
it carried conviction to Wilford’s heart, disarming him for a time of
the fierce anger and resentment he had felt while listening to Morris’s
story. Acting upon the good impulse of the moment, he arose, and
offering his hand to Morris, said,
“Forgive me that I ever doubted you. It was natural that you should
come, but foolish in Katy to send or think Genevra is living. I have
seen her grave myself. I know that she is dead. Did Katy name any one
whom she believed to be Genevra?”
“No one. She merely said she had seen the original of the picture,”
Morris replied.
“A fancy,—a mere whim,” Wilford muttered to himself, as, greatly
disquieted and terribly humbled, he paced the room moodily, trying not
to think hard thoughts either against his wife or Dr. Grant, who,
feeling that it would be pleasanter for Wilford if he were gone,
suggested returning to Silverton at once, inasmuch as the crisis was
past and Katy out of danger. There was a struggle in Wilford’s mind as
to the answer he should make to this suggestion, but at last he
signified his willingness for the doctor to leave when he thought best.
It was broad day when Katy woke, so weak as to be unable to turn her
head upon the pillow, but in her eyes the light of reason was shining,
and she glanced wonderingly, first at Helen, who had come in, and then
at Wilford, as if trying to comprehend what had happened.
“Have I been sick?” she asked in a whisper, and Wilford, bending over
her, replied, “Yes, very sick for nearly two whole weeks—ever since I
left home that morning, you know?”
“Yes,” and Katy shivered a little. “Yes, I know. But where is Morris? He
was here the last I can remember.”
Wilford’s face grew dark at once, and stepping back as Morris came in,
he said, “She asks for you.” Then with a rising feeling of resentment he
watched them, while Morris spoke to Katy, telling her she must not allow
herself in any way to be excited.
“Have I been crazy? Have I talked much?” she asked; and when Morris
replied in the affirmative, she said, “Of whom have I talked most?”
“Of _Genevra_,” was the answer, and Katy continued,
“Did I mention any one else?”
Morris guessed of whom she was thinking, and answered indifferently,
“You spoke of Miss Hazelton in connection with baby, but that was all.”
Katy was satisfied, and closing her eyes fell away to sleep again, while
Morris made his preparations for leaving. It hardly seemed right for him
to go just then, but the only one who could have kept him maintained a
frigid silence with regard to a longer stay, and so the first train
which left New York for Springfield carried Dr. Grant, and Katy was
without a physician.
Wilford had hoped that Mrs. Lennox, too, would see the propriety of
accompanying Morris, but she would not leave Katy, and Wilford was fain
to submit to what he could not help. No explanation whatever had he
given to Mrs. Lennox or Helen with regard to Genevra. He was too proud
for that, but his mother had deemed it wise to smooth the matter over as
much as possible, and enjoin upon them both the necessity of secrecy.
“When I tell you that neither my husband nor daughters know it, you will
understand that I am greatly in earnest in wishing it kept,” she said.
“It was a most unfortunate affair, and though the divorce is, of course,
to be lamented, it is better that she died. We never could have received
her as our equal.”
“Was anything the matter, except that she was poor?” Mrs. Lennox asked,
with as much dignity as was in her nature to assume.
“Well, no. She had a good education, I believe, and was very pretty; but
it makes trouble always where there is a great inequality between a
husband’s family and that of his wife.”
Poor Mrs. Lennox understood this perfectly, but she was too much afraid
of the great lady to venture a reply, and a tear rolled down her cheek
as she wet the napkin for Katy’s head, and wished she had back again the
daughter whose family the Camerons despised. The atmosphere of Madison
Square did not suit Mrs. Lennox, especially when, as the days went by
and Katy began to amend, troops of gay ladies called, mistaking her for
the nurse, and staring a little curiously when told she was Mrs.
Cameron’s mother. Of course Wilford chafed and fretted at what he could
not help, making himself so generally disagreeable that Helen at last
suggested returning home. There was a faint remonstrance on his part,
but Helen did not waver in her decision, and the next day was fixed upon
for her departure.
“You don’t know how I dread your going, or how wretched I shall be
without you,” Katy said, when for a few moments they were alone.
“Everything which once made me happy has been removed or changed. Baby
is dead, and Wilford, oh! Helen, I sometimes wish I had not heard of
Genevra, for I am afraid it can never be with us as it was once; I have
not the same trust in him, and he seems so changed.”
As well as she could, Helen comforted her sister, and commending her to
One who would care for her far more than earthly friends could do, she
bade her good-bye, and with her mother went back to Silverton.